GOP Sen. Rick Brattin was optimistic heading into the final week of Missouri’s 2024 legislative session. Following months of delays and back-and-forth with the House, the Republican-controlled Senate seemed poised to pass legislation (SJR 74) raising the threshold to amend the Missouri Constitution, and thus make it more difficult for Democrats to enshrine abortion into the state’s founding document.
But when the final days of the session arrived, the floor vote to pass initiative petition (IP) reform fell apart.
Despite having the votes necessary to stop a more than 50-hour filibuster from Senate Democrats and send SJR 74 to voters for approval, Senate GOP leadership abruptly adjourned for the rest of the year before getting the measure across the finish line. Republicans’ opportunity to make it harder for radical leftists to change the Missouri Constitution vanished in the blink of an eye.
The maneuver to kill SJR 74 was no accident, however, according to several GOP senators who spoke with The Federalist. What unfolded in the waning days of the 2024 session, they said, was a coordinated campaign orchestrated by Senate GOP leadership to prevent the constitutional amendment proposal from passing.
“The fix was completely in,” Brattin, the chair of the Missouri Freedom Caucus (MOFC), told The Federalist.
The Situation
Originally introduced in January, SJR 74 sought to raise the threshold for amending the Missouri Constitution via initiative petition by requiring the majority of voters in “more than half” of the state’s congressional districts to ratify any constitutional amendment proposal. The
